Hometown Christmas eyes a better 2014

Despite the lack of participation in last year’s annual Ellerbe Hometown Christmas last month, Mayor Lee Berry and the Ellerbe Town Council are already looking to improve on the 2014 event.

The Hometown Christmas for this year will be from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. on Dec. 4. The council discussed setting up the committee for the event on Monday evening.

The committee will start meeting at 5:30 p.m. on the second Monday of each month at Ellerbe Town Hall located at 108 W. Page St. in Ellerbe in hopes of really promoting the event for this year. The event last year attracted only 19 people.

Normally, Hometown Christmas is an annual event that allows businesses and vendors a chance to meet and greet with locals as well as those from surrounding areas. With only 19 participants, this did not go as well as planed for last year.

The event was held on Dec. 21 last year. Because it was so late in the year, many businesses in the area did not want to participate in the event, said Mayor Lee Berry. Much of the year’s festivities were canceled last year due to the lack of interest.

That is why the town is looking to start the planning early and to have the event earlier this time around — giving the committee an extra push in making it an event for the town to remember.

The council also listened to a presentation from the North Carolina Department of Transportation. The presentation was an update on the Comprehensive Transportation Plan for the County. The purpose of the plan is to to identify existing and future transportation deficiencies and objective is to reduce traffic congestion and improve safety.

Dominique Boyd, with NCDOT, gave the town council an update on the long term plan. The plan is currently focusing on a survey that will go out to the residents of Richmond County to find out what issues they see in the county regarding sidewalks, roadways and bicycling trails. The surveys will be available by the end of the month at various locations throughout the county.

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